


Aurora Borealis

by Ryah_Ignis



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Genie/Djinn, M/M, True Love, Witches
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-03-29
Packaged: 2019-11-03 23:10:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17886884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ryah_Ignis/pseuds/Ryah_Ignis
Summary: After an argument, newly human Cas storms out of the bunker.When Dean finally finds him, he's unconscious.  Only a trope as old as time can wake him.





	1. Chapter 1

“Cas.  Wake up.”

The voice floated from what felt like very far away.  Cas’s eyes opened in narrow slits, just wide enough to bring the rumpily crocheted blanket in his arms into focus.  Then, the voice came back.

“Come on, Cas.  It’s time to get up.”

Cas hugged the blanket closer and mashed his face into the pillow.  He could almost feel sleep sweeping over him again when the sheets next to him rustled as someone sat down and the lamp on the nightstand flickered on.

“Too early,” Cas grunted.

“It’s 9:30, babe.”

“Exactly.”

Cas pulled the blanket over his head to punctuate his point.  The sheets next to him rustled again. Cas curled into the warm chest next to him on instinct, only for freezing cold hands to come to a rest on his stomach.

“Traitor!” Cas yelped, jerking back out of reach.

The cold hands, though, had accomplished their purpose.  Cas sat up, the sheets pooling around him, and scrubbed the last of sleep out of his eyes.

Dean sat up, too, grinning in a way that made Cas want to whack him with his pillow.  The small crinkles around his eyes stopped him.

“Not too much a traitor.  I brought you something.”

He flopped over and reached for the cup on the nightstand.  At the sight of Cas’s grabby hands, he stifled a laugh.

“I know I shouldn’t have let Sam get you hooked on this stuff.”

In the weeks after Cas had become human, he’d been exhausted all the time.  It had taken them all an embarrassingly long time to realize that getting three to four hours a night was nowhere near enough for someone who was just getting used to humanity.  Sam’s temporary solution had been to hand him coffee every time he so much as yawned.

“I like the taste.”

Dean made a face. “Dude, no one likes the taste of coffee.  The bean juice just brainwashes you until you decide that you need it to survive.”

Cas shrugged.  He’d always liked the smell of it, especially since it meant that Sam and Dean were getting up in the mornings in the bunker.  He liked the familiarity of it now more than he liked the rush of caffeine.

“You’re wearing my t-shirt again,” Dean observed.

Cas looked down.  Ever since Dean had stumblingly invited him to move in with him, their clothes had been steadily mingling anyway.  (Not that Dean would ever be caught dead wearing the bee sweater that Sam had gotten for Cas in the Goodwill in Smith Center.)

This particular shirt—a well-loved Led Zeppelin tour shirt that Dean had also dug up on that Goodwill trip—had been migrating into Cas’s wardrobe for about a week now.

“It smells like you.”

Cas pulled the collar of the shirt up to his nose.  It was faint—motel shampoo and cheap detergent—but still there.

He might have imagined it, but he was pretty sure that Dean’s voice was a bit wobbly when he spoke.

“You’re a sap.”

Cas tugged the crocheted blanket out from under the sheets and threw it over both their legs.

“I’ve got to get up!” Dean protested.

Cas’s only response was to set his finished coffee down on the nightstand and snuggle down into the sheets again.

“I told Sam I’d go for a run.”

Cas opened one eye to arch his eyebrow at Dean skeptically. 

“What?  You were the one who told me you didn’t want me to drop dead of a heart attack before I turned fifty!”

“I meant for you to stop ordering extra sides of bacon when we’re out,” Cas said with a yawn, already half asleep again.

Dean grumbled something about how Cas was standing in the way of his healthy lifestyle, but Cas knew he’d won when Dean pulled out his phone and fired off a quick text.  Then, he laid down next to Cas, still grumbling under his breath.

“You’re getting better at crocheting,” Dean mumbled into his shoulder.

Cas opened his mouth to thank him, but before he could, he was drifting off to sleep again.

* * *

Dean’s worry had always had a way of hanging over him like a personal raincloud despite his best efforts.  Sam kept sending sideways glances at him to make sure that he wasn’t going to drift off the road.

“We’ll find him,” Sam told him. “It’s Cas.  He’s tough, he’ll be fine.”

Dean didn't answer.  If Sam hadn’t spent most of his life trying to read his microexpressions, he probably would have missed the slight nervous twitch of his jaw.

“You don’t know that.”

Sam looked down at the tablet in his lap. “Take a left up here.”

He hoped to God he was right, that Cas would be okay.

The grimy, disused warehouse looked like virtually every other one that Sam had seen in the last seventeen years.  At the point, he was beginning to theorize that if America were just to clean up all the old warehouses and factories, hunters would be out of a job.

“I can’t get his phone signal any more specific,” Sam said, tucking the tablet away.

He pulled his gun out of his waistband and broke into a slight jog to keep up with Dean.

“I’ll take the second floor.”

Breaking the lock took significantly less effort than it should have—the rusted-out metal snapped easily under Sam’s precise strike.

He took off for the nearest stairwell, his own words not quite comforting enough, even for him.  Tough or not, Cas was still new to being human, much less a human hunter. He had a lot to learn before Sam would stop worrying about him.

The second floor seemed to be made up of offices.  Sam had to poke his head into every disused cubicle.  The former occupants had left a few trinkets behind—was anything ever as creepy as coming across a tattered photo of somebody’s baby in an abandoned building?

“Cas!”

He didn’t stir at the sound of his name.  Sam’s heart leapt into his mouth as he dropped to his knees beside him.  He was already thinking of the best way to tell his brother—thinking of the way that Dean’s hands would tremble, how his face would crumple—when he noticed the ragged rise and fall of Cas’s chest.

“Hey.  Cas? Can you hear me?”

Cas didn’t so much as shift.  Sam’s hands skimmed lightly over his sides, his head.  No major injuries as far as he could tell. Sam slung one arm under Cas’s knees and one underneath his armpits.

Cas was a heavier load than Sam had expected, but he was still a hell of a lot easier to carry than some of the monsters that Sam had lugged to the Impala before.  He hefted Cas down the stairs and almost crashed into Dean headed up two steps at a time.

“He’s not—Cas!”

Dean’s voice notched up slightly in alarm, even as he automatically shifted to take half of Sam’s burden.

“He’s breathing,” Sam confirmed. “Not hurt, either.  I’m not sure what’s going on.”

“Djinn, you think?” Dean asked as they broke out into the crisp night air again.

Sam shrugged the best he could with Cas’s knees still weighing him down. “Wasn’t the right setup for a djinn.  No IVs or anything.”

Maybe it had been a more primitive version than the ones they’d dealt with in the past, but Cas had been missing the telltale blue eyes or any of the marks.

“So then what is it?”

Sam dutifully ignored the slight quaver in his brother’s voice.

“We’ll figure it out.”

It took a little maneuvering to get Cas bundled into the backseat.  Dean tossed the keys over to Sam and clambered in behind him.

Sam glanced in the rearview mirror as he stuck the keys in the ignition.  Dean tucked the half-finished crocheted blanket that Cas had been working on for the last few weeks around Cas’s shoulders.

He didn’t shift in his sleep. Sam steadfastly ignored the way that Dean fumbled for Cas’s limp hand in the dark.

 


	2. Chapter 2

“Oh come on.  You’re crazy.”

Despite his disdain, Dean still leaned over and drizzled the perfect amount of syrup over Cas’s waffles.  The waffle iron had been hard to sell Dean on (“C’mon, Cas, you know pancakes are better”), but Cas was thankful every morning for it.

“Am not,” he shot back, voice slightly muffled by a mouthful of perfectly toasted waffle.

“I’ve made you watch them all,” Dean said despairingly, not even touching his breakfast. “You’ve seen every painful minute.  How could you even say that?”

Cas saw the absolutely perfect response. “Jar Jar Binks is one of the greatest heroes of the Star Wars universe.”

Dean buried his head in his arms.

“Cas, the only appropriate reason to like that trilogy is nostalgia, and you weren’t even on Earth when they were coming out.”

Cas took another thoughtful bite of his waffle. “The only reason people don’t enjoy the prequels is because they were so excited for new Star Wars that they set their expectations far too high for any movie to reasonably reach.”

Dean stabbed his own waffle with a little too much force considering their current conversation.  Cas had to take a sip of his quickly cooling coffee just to hide the amused expression on his face.

“I like the new movies!” Dean protested. “Expectations were high for those, too.”

_ That  _ Castiel knew perfectly well.  Once they’d dealt with the Empty once and for all, the first thing Dean had done was drag him to see Episode IX, which had come out a few days later.

In costume.

It had taken every ounce of strength in Cas’s newly human body not to laugh at the plastic blue lightsaber Dean had bought for the occasion.

“You like Poe Dameron’s face,” Cas contended.

When Dean spluttered through his next sip of coffee, Cas knew that he had won.

“You’re a real jerk, you know that?”

Cas offered him a syrupy grin.  Dean leaned across the table, probably to kiss it off his face, but before he could, Sam appeared in the doorway.

“Well, don’t stop being gross on my account,” Sam said, pulling his earbuds out of his ears. “Dean, what happened to your New Year’s resolution?”

Dean waved a sticky hand. “It’s February.”

Sam wandered over to the fridge and rooted around for a moment before withdrawing with a yogurt.  He peeled the container open as he plopped down on to the bench next to Dean.

“Tell this blasphemer that he doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Dean said, gesturing violently at Cas with his fork.

Sam raised his eyebrows.  Cas just shrugged. There was no reasoning with Dean when he got like that.

Sam pushed some of his sweaty hair out of his face. “Please tell me this isn’t another argument about Star Wars.”

Dean made an indignant noise in the back of his throat. “It’s not an argument, it’s a scholarly debate, first.  Second, it’s not even a debate because he’s just wrong. He thinks Jar Jar is a good character, Sam!”

He said it with the same urgency of tone that his voice had carried during the apocalypse.  Apocalypses, really. Apocolyi?

Sam just stared. “They’re all equally cheesy, Dean.  The prequels are just more self-aware.”

If Cas had thought that Dean was stunned before, it was nothing compared to the shock on his face now.  Cas was forced to take a particularly large bite of his waffles to hide the smile that was threatening at the corner of his mouth again.

“I can’t believe that I live in a house of heathens.”

Dean got to his feet and shoved his chair back dramatically.  How Cas had literally fallen for this man, he would never know.

“Come find me when you’re ready to apologize,” Dean sniffed before marching off toward his room, abandoning his breakfast.

Sam watched him go, amused. “You know what?  I am really happy not to be the center of his rants all the time.”

He clapped Cas on the back with the air of a grizzled soldier reliving a long-ago battle before scooching over and stealing Dean’s seat.

Cas tugged out his phone and typed something into Google.  Sam leaned over the table.

“We have two day shipping,” Sam said, pointing at the screen. “Go with that one.”

Cas hit order on one of the largest Jar Jar Binks masks that Amazon had to offer.

* * *

“Stop pacing,” said Sam for what felt like the thousandth time.

That didn’t stop Dean from turning on his heel and walking the length of the room again.  Sam half-expected him to snarl like a caged lion.

“I can’t just sit here and do nothing while you play witch doctor with Cas!”

Sam didn’t bother to point out that the spells he was using had at no point been used by anything remotely resembling a witch doctor.  The Men of Letters archive was frustratingly European, and Rowena mostly relied on Celtic spells. Instead, he crumbled a few herbs between his fingers in silence.

“It’s freaky that you’re so natural at this stuff,” Dean continued.

Sam bit back a retort--something about how Dean shouldn't complain too much, seeing as he was helping Cas.  Dean tended to lash out when he was worried. Sam had learned a long time ago not to be bothered by it.

“Could you pass me the salamander eyes?” he asked instead.

Dean groused about not being able to eat after handling them--not that he would with Cas possibly hurt--but handed them over anyway.

“What’s that supposed to do, anyway?”

Sam grimaced as he plucked an eye out of the jar and began to grind it into a paste.  Unusually, Dean didn’t make gagging noises in the background.

“Dean.  What’s going on?’

Dean finally stopped his pacing and dropped on to the edge of Cas’s bed.  Cas didn't’ so much as twitch, besides being jostled slightly by the movement.

“We argued.”

Sam raised an eyebrow.  That wasn’t exactly uncommon.  Dean and Cas bickered over everything like an old married couple.  But something in Dean’s voice made him pretend to concentrate very hard on his spellwork.

“He was manning the phones when that call came in about the rugaru.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah.  Good thing we sent Max out there, too, because he sent me a picture once they killed it, and that thing was huge.”

Dean sighed. “Yeah, I know.  Cas wanted to go help and I confronted him.”

Sam could see where this was going all too plainly.  He’d had the same thing happen to him as a kid too many times to count.

“You know, you always came off as kind of patronizing when you did that with me.”

The fact that Dean didn’t so much as open his mouth to defend himself clued Sam in.

“Dean, he’s been fighting longer than any human being--any human  _ civilization-- _ has been around.”

Cas was one of the most competent people that Sam knew, wings or not.  And he was scary smart and an excellent strategist. He couldn’t understand why Dean was so worried about him all the time, unless--

Oh.

“I know that!  But you know that he’d sacrifice himself in a heartbeat if he thought he could save someone else and I--I can’t go through that again.  If he dies, Sam, I--”

Dean cut himself off, face shocked that he had revealed that much.

Sam leaned over and smeared a little of the concoction over Cas’s forehead.  It glowed a sickly green color and faded into his skin.

Sam shook his head. “Not a djinn, then.”

It should have illuminated the blue spiderwebbing beneath Cas’s skin if that was the case.

Dean jolted to his feet and kicked the foot of the bed.  Again, Cas’s limp form jostled, but he didn’s move.

“Fix him,” he snarled.

Then, he spun on his heel and stalked out the door, his fingers flexing nervously by his sides.

Sam looked down at Cas’s unresponsive face.

“Once you wake up, we’ve got to talk.”

He’d never seen his brother in love before.  It was a little unnerving.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all of the support so far :D


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